On Sunday, 9/04/’16, having visited an event at the Floral Hall, Hornsea I went for walk with dog along the beach to the north and beyond the concrete promenade. In places the coltsfoot were in full flower the day being sunny (for a change), like daisies and lesser celandines the flowers open and close with the sunshine. Like along South Ferriby ‘cliff’ the coltsfoot retain a foot-hold in the topsoil even when the cliff-face has slumped after being undercut by spring tides.
Like Withernsea and Kilnsea, ironically, the name Hornsea has nothing to do with ‘the sea’. The suffix ‘sea’ is derived from the Anglo-Saxon for lake/pool and refers to the post-glacial meres that were once dotted across Holderness and of which Hornsea Mere is the only survivor. Surviving evidence shows that Hornsea was a medieval market settlement but with a modest out-port at the mouth of a stream that flowed from the Mere. Two 17th century county maps (one of 1645 and Morden’s map of 1695, both in the collection of county maps at the Treasure House, Beverley) confirm this by naming ‘Hornsey’, ‘Hornsey’ Beck and ‘Hornsey’ Mere although, no name is given for the out-port. Both maps give a stylised symbol for a second medieval church (to that of the surviving St. Nicholas) in the area. Further county maps up to the late 18th century confirm that the drainage pattern across Holderness was, as had been the case since Halocene deposition, channelled east to the River Hull or south to the Humber (not seaward) – this being because land rose as deposition increased eastwards and still evidenced at Dimlington ‘high cliffs’ between Withernsea and Kilnsea.